STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. Mayor Bill de Blasio was at it again last week, making Staten Island feel like its not part of New York City. At least not a valued part.

How many times have we felt that way since de Blasio became mayor in 2014?

This time it had to do with funding for New York City Housing Authority community centers.

Last Tuesday, de Blasio said that $22 million shifted from the NYPD would go to NYCHA centers in every borough.

Except, it turns out, on Staten Island.

City Hall at first had no explanation for the oversight. Later, the mayors office said that the funding was allocated based on vacant or shuttered NYCHA centers in need of renovation.

That took care of facilities in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx. And a center in Queens was given expense money for programming.

City Halls justification changed nothing: It was a four-borough effort in a five-borough city.

All this is happening while a planned $5.7 million renovation to a community center in Mariners Harbor remains stuck in limbo.

Its the second time lately that the Island was left out of a City Hall initiative. De Blasio also neglected to include Staten Island in his cool streets plan, which added spray caps to hydrants around the city in an order to help New Yorkers beat the heat.

Streets on Staten Island were included only after the Advance highlighted the oversight.

Do the maps used by City Hall include all five boroughs? For an avowedly political animal, de Blasio can be positively clueless when it comes to simple political optics.

City Hall couldnt find an Island community center that needed some upgrading? He didnt think we needed any cool streets here? Just how do these decisions get made?

Sadly, were getting used to this kind of dismissive treatment during the coronavirus pandemic.

Back in April, as the worst of the pandemic was taking hold here, we learned that Staten Island would receive none of the military medical personnel sent to the city by the federal government.

De Blasio had asked the Trump administration for doctors, nurses and other medical personnel to help us deal with the growing virus problem.

But the personnel that the feds sent were ticketed for city Health + Hospitals facilities. Staten Island is the only borough without an H+H hospital, so we received none of those resources.

We were also left wanting when the city sent more of its own resources to stressed H+H hospitals. City hospitals got more beds, more personnel, and free COVID testing for staff.

But, again, Staten Island received nothing because we dont have a city hospital here.

You see how that keeps snowballing?

De Blasio and the city Department of Transportation also used the cover of the pandemic to cut back on overnight Staten Island Ferry service, even though service every 30 minutes is mandated by city law.

The schedule has been beefed up recently as the city has come back to life, but heres no telling when the full schedule will be returned to us. The city also took away lower-level boarding of the boats during the pandemic, even though that can cause more crowding when loading the boats.

If you didnt know any better, youd think that the city was using the pandemic to give the Island a final kiss-off. Although, yes, de Blasio did close streets to traffic here so that pedestrians and cyclists could use the roads. And we did get some personal protective equipment from the city. And the mayor did come here to help paint a Black Lives Matter tribute on the street near the 120th Precinct stationhouse.

So de Blasio does have his priorities. Its just that Staten Island isnt often among them.

Read the rest here:

Another Staten Island slight from de Blasio (opinion) - SILive.com